A heated argument between neighbours turned ugly leaving a 34-year-old man dead and landing a father and son in prison. The accused,Amit Gandhi and his father Ravinder,allegedly murdered their neighbour Santosh Kumar with a screw driver in front of his house in Sector 30 around 10 pm on Sunday. Kumar ran a general store and is survived by his wife and five children  four daughters and a son.

The Chandigarh Police arrested the two accused and booked them for murder and furtherance of common intention. They were remanded to judicial custody by a local court on Monday. The police have also registered a case of attempt to murder against the duo as they allegedly assaulted the victims cousin. They did not seek the remand of the accused as the murder weapon (screwdriver) has been found.

According to the victims cousin,Akhilesh Kumar,there was a simmering conflict between the two families as Amit believed that Akhileshs wife Rani was turning Amits wife Leena against him.

Akhilesh alleged that on Sunday night at 9.15,his mother called him home from work as a crowd had gathered around his house. I took an auto and reached home to see that Amit,his wife Leena,father Ravinder and mother Shakuntala had come to my house and were abusing my family, he said.

According to Akhilesh,Amit and his wife started abusing him and told him to keep a check on his wife. As the quarrel turned ugly,Amit slapped me, the victims cousin said.

He added that Santosh then came downstairs and confronted Amit. At this point,the quarrel took a turn for the worse as Amit allegedly began hitting Akhilesh with a screwdriver. The victims cousin further alleged that when Santosh tried to intervene,Amit and his family members started hitting Santosh with the screwdriver.

Santosh was hit six times on his body with the screwdriver  once on the head,once near the heart,once near the kidney and thrice on the back, Akhilesh said.

He also alleged that his neighbours family did not let him take Santosh leave for hospital in a tempo. They threatened to burn the tempo when we tried to take Santosh to the hospital. Fearing this,the driver of the tempo ran away and we had to call the police to take him to General Medical College and Hospital-32 in the police Gypsy, he added.

Santosh died on his way to the hospital.

The police then arrested Amit and Ravinder from their house at 4 am on Monday. They have been booked under Sections 302,307 and 34 of the IPC.

According to the police,they recovered the screwdriver near Guru Nanak Khalsa Senior Secondary School at Sector 30-B.